Comments by "ke6gwf - Ben Blackburn" (@ke6gwf) on "Why Are There so Many Types of Screws?!" video.

  1. You usually get things right, but you really screwed up on the facts this time. The inch was standardized in the US back in the 1800s, and had nothing to do with barley corns, which had been a British thing long before (though it is still the basis for shoe sizes lol). We developed the US Customary system of weights and measures, based on the English units, but we actually standardized things instead of using barley corns or body part sizes, and so they didn't all match anymore with the English units. We basically created a system that worked well for an industrial nation, and was given units to serve the different needs of industry. For instance, machinists use thousandths, surveyors use tenths of a foot, carpenters use fractions, etc, because they work well for the unique requirements of each. Later England made their own standard system, the Imperial System. During ww2, it was discovered that because the US Customary inch and the Imperial inch were a few millionths different, they were having problems with shared technologies and equipment. So in the 1950s they decided to meet in the middle and make the Inch standard around the world, and the Imperial inch lengthed by 1.7 millionths of an inch and the USC inch shortened by 2 millionths of an inch. They picked this point because it also eliminated all the extra decimal points from the metric conversion and brought it to exactly 25.4 mm, instead of 25.46372846 or whatever it had been lol So to claim that the inch was first standardized in the 1950s and had been based on barley corns all through the history of the United States, 2 world wars, and us leading the world in industrial growth and development, is either a lie, or shows that you think that metric is so much better that the inch doesn't deserve any respect or accurate history. It is just the common YouTube comment level of factless scorn on another group or belief system, and has no scientific validity or even basic accuracy. Yes, for science and theory, metric is a lot better, but for instance carpentry is a lot easier dealing with 8 foot boards rather than 2440mm boards. And when using a tape measure, it is a lot easier to glance at a fractions scale than count mm. So basically, we developed a logical and perfectly functional standardized system long before anyone else did, and built the largest industrial nation on it, and now everyone else is saying that we are stupid for not spending trillions of dollars to convert from something that works perfectly well for us to what someone else uses. That's like saying we should stop speaking English because most people speak Chinese. And since we already use metric wherever it makes more sense, trying to say that we should stop using US Customary when it makes more sense is just ludicrous. Oh, and to make clear, US Customary is not based on the Metric System! The conversion factor has been locked in between Metric, US Customary, and Imperial, but they still retain their own units. Just like the metric system retained it's units when it was redefined by the speed of light and Plank's Constant. So please if you are going to cast shade on our system of measurement, at least use truthful facts. It doesn't destroy your credibility as an engineer that way.
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